1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a computer system, and deals more specifically with a method and system for distributing electronic documents into and from a printing apparatus' electronic mailbox.
2. Description of the Related Art
In today's office environment a need exists to transfer files and documents from one individual to another individual or to multiple individuals. One of the most popular and easiest methods of transferring documents is via electronic mail (e-mail). In this scenario, the individual sends an electronic copy of the document by attaching it as a file to an e-mail message and then sending the message to the recipient(s) e-mail address. In general, an e-mail address is comprised of a user's identification and an e-mail server identification. For example, in the e-mail address johndoe@email.com. “johndoe” identifies the recipient or user and “email.com” identifies the e-mail server. When the e-mail arrives at the e-mail server, the e-mail message along with the attached electronic copy of the document are stored in a electronic virtual mailbox of the e-mail application, where the mailbox is identified by the user's identification part of the e-mail address. The electronic virtual mailbox is typically either a memory location or a disk storage area on the server. Other methods of transferring files and documents include using a file transfer protocol (FTP) application and a network terminal file system (NTFS) application.
In many instances, in addition to an electronic copy of the document, a hardcopy of the document is required as well. One method of obtaining a hardcopy involves the use of a printing apparatus, such as a digital copier. In a typical case, to obtain a hardcopy of the electronic document, the document recipient opens the document using its associated application, and then prints the document on the digital copier using the application's print function. In another instance, the document sender wants the document recipient to have a “print-ready” copy of the document. In this case, the document sender makes use of the digital copier's electronic mailbox feature. Most digital copiers contain electronic mailboxes, where an electronic mailbox is assigned to a particular user of that digital copier. It works in much the same manner as the e-mail electronic virtual mailbox. However, instead of e-mailing the document to the digital copier, the document sender prints the document to the document recipient's electronic mailbox residing on the digital copier.
The current approach of providing the document recipient with an electronic copy of the document via e-mail and a “print-ready” copy requires two separate actions on the part of the document sender. The document sender must go through the steps of e-mailing a copy of the document to the document recipient, as well as go through the steps of storing a “print-ready” copy on the digital copier. These separate actions are necessary because there is no connectivity between the document recipient's e-mail electronic virtual mailbox and the document recipient's digital copier electronic mailbox.
In addition, in order to send a document to the document recipient's digital copier electronic mailbox, the document sender must have knowledge of the identification format used to identify the document recipient's electronic mailbox on the digital copier. This identification format is typically not user friendly (i.e., mailboxes are identified by numbers not users and the association between numbers and users is not readily available).
Another problem is that the assignment of users to digital copier electronic mailboxes can vary from digital copier to digital copier. For example, in a company with two digital copiers, an employee could be assigned electronic mailbox “1” on the first digital copier and electronic mailbox “2” on the second digital copier. Or, an employee may only be assigned an electronic mailbox on only one of the digital copiers. Under either scenario, a co-worker wanting to provide a “print-ready” copy of a document to the employee's digital copier electronic mailbox would have to know which digital copier or copiers the employee was assigned to and what the employee's electronic mailbox number was on each digital copier. In order to provide any future documents, the co-worker would have to keep track of this information. The same problems apply when trying to provide an electronic copy of the document via other electronic document transfer applications (e.g. FTP).
What is needed is an application that simplifies the process for providing recipients with an electronic copy of a document via an electronic document transfer application and a “print-ready” copy of the document via a printing apparatus.